The dental restoration of a partially or wholly edentulous patient with artificial dentition is typically done in two stages. In the first stage, an incision is made through the gingiva to expose the underlying bone. An artificial tooth root, in the form of a dental implant, is placed in the jawbone for osseointegration. The dental implant generally includes a threaded bore to receive a retaining screw for holding mating components thereon. During the first stage, the gum tissue overlying the implant is sutured and heals as the osseointegration process continues.
Once the osseointegration process is complete, the second stage is initiated. Here, the gingival tissue is re-opened to expose an find of the dental implant. A healing component or healing abutment is fastened to the exposed end of the dental implant to allow the gingival tissue to heal therearound. It should be noted that the healing abutment can be placed on the dental implant immediately after the implant has been installed and before osseointegration, thereby, for some situations, combining the osseointegration step and gingival healing step into a one-step process.
Implant dentistry restorative methods have advanced beyond requiring a level (e.g., dental implant level) impression as the starting point for developing a final dental prosthesis. In some such cases pre-defined scan bodies (e.g., Encode Healing Abutments available from Biomet 3i, LLC) are assembled to the dental implants prior to and/or during the gingival healing stage. The pre-defined can bodies include scannable features (e.g., markers) that, when scanned and interpreted, provide information about the location and orientation of the underlying dental implant that is used in developing the final dental prosthesis.
A model of the patient's mouth is typically created for use in developing the final dental prosthesis. The model of the patient's mouth is modified to include a dental implant analog that is placed/installed in the model at a position corresponding to the position of the actual underlying dental implant in the patient's mouth. Some prior methods of placing the dental implant analog in the model of the patient's mouth required the use of a robot. Although such methods using robotic placement provide benefits (e.g., accurate placement of the dental implant analog), such methods are reliant on having robotic equipment and accompanying software. Thus, a need exists for other alternative methods for placing dental implant analogs in a model of a patient's mouth for use in developing a final dental prosthesis. The present disclosure is directed to solving these and other needs.